Everything you need to know about Gboard — The Google keyboard
We live in a product-driven world. Software products assist us in booking a cab, reading blogs, listening to music and even dating a person. I wanted to appreciate those products that are making my life easier on the aspects of technology, design, business and user satisfaction.
I got introduced to mobile phones when I was 7 years old. I used to spend about 1.5 hours every day playing Snake Xenzia on my dad’s Nokia 1100 (the most rugged phone on the planet). It was fun, but there were three major problems with Nokia’s keypad.
- My nails would damage the keypad.
- The skin near my nails would hurt (the aftermath of long-pressing)
- The text/number over each button would wear off over time. So you need to memorize where the 1s, 5s, 9s and all the characters were.
Despite the difficulties, alphanumeric keyboards were all over the market. Whichever mobile phone you bought, it had this beautiful interface. Not very late, Qwerty for mobiles peeped in and the world went crazy!
Wait! All this sounds a little archaic and old-school right? You came here to know about the Gboard!!!
Boom! May 2016, the Gboard was released on iOS. Being an android user, I had to wait until December 2016 to utilize the features of this pleasing product. It was a tough test of patience but worth the wait.
Technology and Design
I realized this is going to be a fascinating product the moment I saw the built-in search feature. People no longer needed to switch between apps for searching and sharing. You can search the entirety of the internet with Gboard. You can double-tap on your space-bar to leave a period. It also acts as a track-pad when you firmly touch it.
Glide-typing to type faster by sliding your fingers, voice-typing to dictate text while your hands are busy, translating text as you type, being more expressive by sending GIFs, using sensational stickers, one-handed keyboard and what not?
Gboard comes with a bundle of such features that is way better than Microsoft’s SwiftKey or Swype Inc’s Swype.
Precise Predictions:
Google does this phenomenal magic by using a heavy dose of machine learning.
The main thing going on behind the scenes is a trained model working with your data and that of millions of other users, as well as models it was trained on, to figure out what somebody may be trying to type based on a word flow gesture or typing that may be less than precise.
The way that the model for gesture typing is laid out is like an acoustic model, while the model for correcting errors in users trying to type traditionally and messing up is a bit more like a normal neural networking model.
Complete set of features:
Coming to the aesthetics, google’s material design gives life to the set of rectangles, squares and circles on your virtual keyboard, making it clean and simple that’s a pleasure to type on. Seamless interaction enhances the user experience to a greater extent.
Morse code on Gboard
This is by far the best update for virtual keyboards!
Developer Tania Finlayson found her voice through Morse code. Now she’s partnered with Google to bring Morse code to Gboard, so others can try it for accessible communication.
Most technology today is designed for the mass market. Unfortunately, this can mean that people with disabilities can be left behind. Developing communication tools like this is important, because for many people, it simply makes life livable. Now, if anyone wants to try Morse code, they can use the phone in their pocket. Just by downloading an app, anyone anywhere can give communicating with Morse code a try.
- Tania Finlayson.
With these extraordinary set of features, Gboard has now reached over 1 billion downloads making it one of the most predominant keyboards used by people all over the world. Lots of Android devices already use Gboard by default. It’s been widely available to download for a year and a half.
But if you have an iPhone, or a Samsung Galaxy, or anything else that doesn’t live up to the touch-typing experience that your fingers deserve, it’s high-time for an upgrade!
Thank you! I truly appreciate you for reading my first post. If you found this article of value, click on the applause button to help other people find it.
With lots of love for products, people and life,
- Bharath
